1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to electronic equipment such as videocassette recorders (VCR), televisions, and monitors, and more particularly to electronic equipment adapted to reduce power consumption (standby power) during no operation (no use).
2. Description of the Prior Art
A description will be made of conventional electronic equipment, e.g., a VCR apparatus. Most of VCR apparatuses include a receiving part (light receiving part) that receives electrical signals (e.g., light signals) corresponding to power ON/OFF operations (including various VCR operations) from a remote controller, and because of the need to perform light receiving and other processing for the automatic power ON/OFF operations by the remote controller, even when power to the electronic equipment is OFF, they keep a primary power supplying circuit ON at all times wherein part of a secondary power supplying circuit is kept connected to the primary power supplying circuit.
Therefore, even when the secondary power supplying circuit is OFF, power is supplied to the primary power supplying circuit at all times and a corresponding amount of power continues to be consumed, with the result that several watts of power are consumed even during no use (no operation).
A power control circuit of such a VCR apparatus, as shown in FIG. 6 by a schematic diagram showing main portions of the circuit, comprises: a primary power supplying circuit 1 to which 100 V AC is supplied from a power supplying terminal 1a; a power transformer 2; a signal and motor power circuit 3 and a control power circuit 4 making up a secondary power supplying circuit; a signal and motor circuit 6; a control circuit 7 comprising a microcomputer and other parts; a power control transistor 8; a resistor 9; a switching transistor 10; and an ON/OFF switch (DC switch) 11 for manually sending a signal for switching between an activation state and a standby state.
Power is supplied to this power control circuit; when power to the electronic equipment is ON, the ON/OFF switch 11 is turned OFF manually by an operator, or the power is automatically turned off by a remote controller; the control circuit 7 detects this event and sends a signal to the power control transistor 8 to turn the power off; thereby, the switching transistor 10 is turned off and power from the signal and motor power circuit 3 to the signal and motor circuit 6 is shut off; and the electronic equipment is shifted to a power OFF state.
In conventional electronic equipment, even when power is OFF, both the signal and motor power circuit 3 and the control power circuit 4 making up a secondary power supplying circuit are connected through the power transformer 2 with the primary power supplying circuit 1 to which 100 V AC is inputted. Therefore, there has been a problem in that power continues to be consumed as standby power by an amount corresponding to it.
When light such as noise passes through the light receiving part of the electronic equipment for some reason, power to the electronic equipment changes from OFF to ON against the operator""s will, in which case power continues to be consumed. When a malfunction such as runaway occurs in the control circuit 7 for some reason, ON/OFF operations by the ON/OFF switch 11 or the remote controller could not be detected by the control circuit 7 and the electronic equipment might go out of control of power ON/OFF operations. If the primary power supplying circuit 1 is ON in such a case, power will continue to be consumed against the operator""s will.
As described previously, when the control circuit 7 goes out of control, in the case of the conventional electronic equipment, the user had nothing to do but remove the power supplying terminal la from the electric outlet to stop power from being supplied to the primary power supplying circuit 1.
In common houses, however, electronic equipment such as televisions or VCRs is often placed near to a wall of a room, an outlet for plugging the power supplying terminal 1a is wired to the wall, and to remove the power supplying terminal 1a from the outlet, troublesomely, it has been necessary to move the electronic equipment placed close to the wall.
The present invention provides electronic equipment that can shut off and supply power to a primary power supplying circuit by automatic operations, directly shut off power to the primary power supplying circuit by easy manual operations based on the operator""s will, and never fails to zero power consumption of the primary power supplying circuit during no use.
As a first embodiment for solving the above problem, electronic equipment of the present invention comprises: a primary power supplying circuit; a secondary power supplying circuit to which power is supplied from the primary power supplying circuit; a control circuit connected to the secondary power supplying circuit; a switch apparatus provided with a switch; and charge storage means connected between the control circuit and the switch apparatus, wherein the switch apparatus includes: an operation member for switching the switch between manual ON and OFF positions in which ON/OFF operations are manually performed, and an automatic ON/OFF position in which ON/OFF operations can be automatically performed; and a driving source for automatically operating the switch, wherein, in the automatic ON/OFF position, the driving source is driven by a signal from the control circuit or power supplied from the charge storage means to automatically turn the switch ON or OFF, whereby power to the primary power supplying circuit can be automatically supplied or shut off, and wherein the operation member is manually operated to turn the switch ON or OFF, whereby power to the primary power supplying circuit can be manually supplied or shut off.
Furthermore, as a second embodiment, the switch apparatus includes a driving member for turning the switch ON and OFF wherein the driving member is disposed so as to be freely engaged with and disengaged from the operation member; when the operation member is operated into the automatic ON/OFF position, the driving member is disengaged from the operation member so that the switch can be automatically turned ON and OFF by driving the driving member by the driving source; and when the operation member is operated into the manual ON or OFF position, the driving member is engaged with the operation member and is directly operated by the operation member to keep the switch ON or OFF and restrain the driving of the driving member by the driving source.